He hardly plays anymore and there's a rumour he's not on the best of terms with Terry after the racism accusations. Terry is by far the better player, so he goes and Rio stays home.

I see. So, who's gonna be Terry's CB partner? Cahill?

Lescott I would think.

I'd prefer Cahill and I don't even like Cahill.

Terry a better player?!

EDIT: No sarcasm. I have not watched any English football this season. But all I can think of about terry are his numerous gaffes.

Terry's been one of the best players in league since Di Matteo took over. AVBs insistance on playing a high line would make any defender without great pace look bad.

Bent and Richards are not even on the standby list? Very surprising.

At least he's not going to get tapped up like Barry, Young et al I suppose.

New Nike Ad: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QMv8g8CO4cQ&hd=1

Great ad.

Good thing Pato stayed in the car...no chance of injury there.

wtf is LeBron James doing in this ad?

He's sponsored by nike, so they can put who ever the want in it, so he got a cameo!

No but, seriously, more and more often you're seeing these sort of cameos appearances in these branding ads, and it makes sense, it give the viewing public a better idea of their 'superstars'.

More exposure, leads to more fame, more fame = more money.

Brazil beat Denmark 3-1. Thiago played the full 90 minutes.

Some upsets tonight.

Netherlands 1-2 Bulgaria
Switzerland 5-3 Germany
Norway 0-1 England

You consider England beating Norway an upset?

I'm not the biggest admirer, but England have a good squad and imo should be able to get out of their group easily, especually without all the usual hoopla from the British press about how they'll dominate the footballing world.

I consider us beating anyone an upset at the moment!


We have a tough group and of the 2 players we have that can score a goal 1 is not at the Euros and the other is suspended for the first 2 games.

You should work for our press. I deem it a big success if we get out of the group.

Yep. France are a lottery, they can go o ut in the groups or make the final, it's anyones guess. Sweden we've beaten once in 40 years. Ukraine are dominant at home and are hosting. I think all groups are very tight to be honest, no team has it easy.

I love the entire reverse phsycology thing you're trying to pull off!

But England still have a very talented squad. Even without Rooney for the first 2 games I think they should be able to do it. You guys have a very good defensive line, some very talented midfielders and for once a very good keeper.

I wouldn't be surprised if England and Sweden made it out of the group.

Nah, I'm not. I'm being brutally honest it's one of the, if not the worst England team I've seen go to a major tournament (in my lifetime).

Well the squad could have been picked a lot better, not calling Richards for example, who do you have at RB as an option? Aren't all of Cole, Johnson and Baines natural LBs?

Also, isn't Bent injured?

England's biggest miss is clearly Wilshire, one of the best midfielders around who isn't from Spain right now, I think he's amazing and England are desperate for someone like him, the Lampard Gerrard combination clearly doesn't work as we've seen it tried over and over in these tournaments.

Still, there are some good options in midfield especially, not coming out of that group would still be considered a huge failure, and not just by the English press. Only France can beat England man for man but they're not known as the most cohesive team around

I love how actual proper English fans say "We'll be lucky to make it out of the groups" while the rest of the World says "Nah, you'll do it easy". Then when we fail, the rest of the World will say "Typical English, fail to get out of the groups, they hype the team too much".

English fans don't hype the team. Foreigners do.


Johnson is a left back.

Bent's not injured but returning from injury so wasn't picked. Rooney is suspended for the first 2 games so that's our only goalscorers out.

Wilshire is out, Barry got injured last night so that's, in my opinion, our best 2 CM options out/doubtful.

No Ferdinand means that Lescott/Cahill/Jagielka will start and they're not of Rio quality.

Like Ash said, worst England squad since.. in my lifetime to be honest.

The only ones who really hype the English team are the English press. Foreigners mostly look at the English squad and one has to admit that you've had some great teams in these last few tournaments. So when that team fails and the English media are left licking their wounds and take out their bitter anger at the team and coach, we the foreigners, are always left laughing

I personally like to look at things on paper, and on paper your squad should be able to beat all 3 teams in your group. Of course this means nothing as the performance is what really counts. England are known for failing in these tournaments so I'll assure you that I won't be betting any money on them going through. But still, I personally think that they will go through...

We'll talk about this later though, at least once we've seen the first set of games. That should be a good indicator...

Did Carroll get called up btw?


Yeah that's what I was asking.

Who's going to play at RB for you when Cole, Johnson and Baines are all LBs and Richards wasn't called up.

Hmm, didn't know about the Barry injury, what formation does Hodgson play?

Typical 4-4-2?

But that's the thing, the actual English fans that watch football know we aren't going to win and are mostly content with regular QF placings like myself. Foreigners seem to think we can do better than laugh when we don't, it makes no sense.


Yes he did. Though I am not unhappy with that. Carroll is one of the most physically gifted players in football. Probably he has is that in the EPL, a lot of centre backs are big players who pla a physical game, I think he actually fits the International game better where he an boss more technically gifted, but less physical, defenders.


Sorry, Johnson is a right back. Had no idea why I said left back. Johnson and Jones will be the RBs. Jones played there a lot for United this season.


Barry's not out, but a major doubt, so hopefully he can play.

Hodgson went 4-4-1-1 last night with Young behind Carroll. I think he'll stick to this.

To be honest we haven't had a capable side or a good chance since the 2002-04 period where a lot of players were in their prime (and were highly unfortunate in Portugal for numerous reasons). Sure we still had holes in some areas of the team but no where near what they are now.

The only guy that's coming through the team as mentioned who looks potential to be really world class is Wilshere and he's been crocked all year and may not return the same player unfortunately but we won't know that until next season. The Premier League is great in large part to foreign talent and because it's the global league England as an international side will continue to suffer and ultimately get worse unless drastic changes happen.

The thing is most of our media isn't hyping us up and hasn't done for some years. The ones that are also show topless models every day on the entry page of the newspaper, illegally hack into technology for stories and write highly opinionated articles, mainly from people looking for a reaction and some free PR for the paper - so draw your own conclusion from that one.

Don't mean to stir anything up, but I do recall several booths in Marble arch selling England goods in summer 2010, where they had the England shirts with two stars on it.

I personally had great expectations as Capello was on board too, but all that is gone now. I do agree with han though, that on paper England has a very capable team. In addition to that, Chelsea's showing of grit and determination in the final, that could be inspiration in itself.

You never know really, but one thing is certain, there are a lot of good sides in this year .. Hence it'd be difficult to call out an outcome this early on.

France just went 2-0 down to Iceland, 35 mins gone.

Everyone using the underdog strategy these days...

Gourcuff has been awful. Completely none-existant in this game.

As I was saying

I haven't watched any of the International friendlies. I'll probably watch Italy's game on Tuesday, see what Prandelli will put out

France won 3-2 in the end. Fortunately results aren't important in friendlies, performances are, and they looked crap.

I have truly heard it all.

Yes, the lad can header, yes he is not weak. But this is a truly bizarre comment to make. But then, you did also feel Ashley Cole is the greatest English player of all time so I suppose it's par for the course with you.

PS: I know this sounds incendiary, it's not meant to be. I just feel some of your views re: England are quite...out there.

But, you're better than Scotland right now so that's one for your resume

I can't agree with either comment. Ashley Cole is one of the best ever because I don't think we've ever had many players who've been the best at their position for a decade.

And yes, I do think Carroll is one of the most physically gifted players in football. Probably the best we've had since Emile Heskey around 10 years ago. Do you not think size, power, pace and strength are enough to be considered that? It has little to do with their actual ability.

And yes, fortunately I do not conform to the norm of what the papers and tv tell me. I find it hilarious when some will label "X the greatest England player of all-time" with probably seeing about 2 hours with of highlights of his entire career.

Papers and TV haven't said anyone in particular is the greatest English player of all time, you devised it yourself after the CL final.



Well it ain't Andy Carroll anyway

There's constant tv programmes and articles about England's best ever this and that.


No, it's Ashley Cole.

I've seen plenty 'Euro moments' shows etc but none strictly about England. Although I watched the former because Lynsey Hipgrave is incredibly easy on the eye.



It really is not!

Interesting thing on Panorama about the racism trouble in Poland and Ukraine, disturbing footage. I can't hate on the BBC anymore, the way they basically send out a huge F U to FIFA and UEFA all the time is brilliant.

Pacific Quay is a shambles, but UK wide BBC is still quite good when it comes to this kind of journalism.

I'm not being xenophobic in saying that many Easter bloc nations are incredibly racist.

Damn was really looking forward to seeing that one tonight. Can't they just play it in another stadium...

Dude, at least 10 people died, and you thinking about a friendly match?

It's not about the venue, but about the tragedy that's befallen Italy. Ten people are dead and dozens are missing. Who cares about a friendly match at the moment?

Ahh... Didn't know that it was that bad. I'm sort of out of the news loop

That's the main thing it seemed to be. Some of it was horrible and I'm not condoning it anyway, but I can't help but think they went pretty out of there way to go to the worst areas in the country to get this kind of footage. To be honest if the Olympics weren't being held in England Panorama would have had a 30 minute special on the London Riots and fear-monging about how dangerous it is here. You could easily turn that moment where an asian guy covered in blood gets robbed and make that come across as purely racial.

It's bad, obviously still but no country is perfect as the BBC love pointing out (unless it's the British Isles).

Well said Ash

So where is Gourcuff now? Almost three years ago there were venomous posts towards Galliani and Co for not keeping our rising star.

More like fallen star

I think the most worrying thing is not actually the violence. What is disturbing is that when the Ukrainian fans were quite clearly doing Nazi salutes, the FA were saying "No, no, they were pointing to opposition fans". It's like they're scared to do anything, they actually defend/choose to ignore this kind of behaviour.

I agree regarding the London riots. But I don't think our committee or government has ever shyed away from pointing out that the Olympics is being held in a relatively poor area, if anything they glorify it saying it's being held where "real" people live. I don't think you'd get them saying "No, no, they weren't rioting, they were just misplaced bonfires" or any other retarded excuse.

Though their foreign ministry spokesman said this:


I have been to over 500 Premier League, FA Cup and League Cup games in England. I have never seen a single Nazi symbol.

True, but that doesn't mean you can't in the future. Someone might just sneak up with one!